On  May 27, 1934, Florence Spence became my wife in a  small 
        private  ceremony  in  her  parents' home.  We  had  only  a  few 
        belongings,  and lived for the remainder of that summer  with  my 
        folks, one block west of Grace and Ora Spence.  My five  brothers 
        loved  Florence  as well as if she were their  very  own  sister.  
        After all, she was the first girl in the family.  They still love 
        her in a very special way.
        
             God  had  called me into His ministry.  I didn't  know  much 
        about our future, but I did know that God had laid His hand  upon 
        me.   I  recall my father, on January 24, 1933, lifting  his  old 
        Bible  high overhead and saying, "Son, if you're going to  preach 
        the  Gospel,  get this Book in your heart; because  through  this 
        Book  operates  the  power of God."  Since that day  I  had  been 
        endeavoring  to obey his admonition, and still am striving to  do 
        so.
        
             Knowing  the  Bible alone, however, is not  sufficient:   we 
        must  first know Jesus.  I was sent once to a church for  revival 
        services  south of Knoxville, Tennessee, and there I met a  young 
        man who had gone through four years of intensive Bible  training.  
        He sat through seven to nine services before that eventful  night 
        when he made his way swiftly to the altar to find Jesus Christ as 
        his  Saviour.   He  knew the Bible, had  taught  the  Bible,  had 
        preached the Bible, but he didn't know Jesus in his heart.   When 
        he  did meet the Master, he said it was the happiest day  of  his 
        life.   He had spent years learning about God's word, but he  had 
        never let the Word become flesh within him.
        
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             The  Fall of 1934, I entered Taylor University.  I  was  not 
        much  interested  in  academic study, but  the  Lord  helped.   I 
        discovered that they taught sanctification there as well.  I knew 
        very little about holiness subsequent to regeneration.  My father 
        had  never heard it preached either, and understood little  about 
        it.   He had preached for years and knew people claiming  a  high 
        state  of  holiness  who  wouldn't pay their bills.   "Well," Dad 
        would  say,  "I don't think there is much to  it,  because  there 
        isn't  anybody  much  living  it."   He  rejected  sanctification 
        because of the neglect of a few.  And I was of the same mind.  My 
        professor  taught me that after a person is justified, he  should 
        be sanctified.  "I just don't believe it," I still said.
       
             The  next  Fall we returned for our second year  at  Taylor.  
        The  college had scheduled Dr. Paul Rees as speaker for a  week's 
        series  of  meetings.   Dr. Rees is probably  one  of  the  great 
        preachers  in the earth.  He is called the Prince  of  Preachers, 
        and  is a very gracious, kind, gentle man.  On the last night  of 
        services,  September 22, 1935, he preached on sanctification.  He 
        had  completed the message and the congregation was  singing  the 
        altar call hymn, when all of a sudden, during the second or third 
        stanza, I heard a voice say, "LORAN HELM--WHAT ARE YOU  GOING 
        TO DO ABOUT YOUR SANCTIFICATION?" 
        
             It frightened me.  I said within myself, "I am not going  to 
        do anything."
        
             A  second time the voice asked:  "WHAT ARE YOU GOING  TO 
        DO ABOUT YOUR SANCTIFICATION?" 
        
             I  didn't  know what to do.  Again I  answered,  "No."   The 
        third time God spoke to me, and once more I said, "No!"  When  He 
        spoke the fourth time, His power struck me on the top of my  head 
        and operated all through my body until I thought I was turning to 
        stone.   When the power reached my heart, it began to  bring  the 
        life right up out of my body.  I tell you, when your life  starts 
        leaving you, you are going to do something about it.
        
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             You see, I was a stubborn person.  If I believed  something, 
        I stayed with it regardless of what the crowd thought.  And I was 
        convinced that there was nothing to sanctification.  But God  was 
        the  One  persuading me now, and He was desiring to  move  me  to 
        sanctification.  His power was taking the life out of me.
        
             I came out into the aisle and I thought I was crying at  the 
        top  of my voice.  My wife told me later that she could not  hear 
        me,  but I felt I was yelling as loud as I could, because  I  was 
        desperate.   If  God ever comes on you as He has come on  me,  it 
        will move you around some.  It won't make any difference who  you 
        are.  God will move you.
        
             The devil said,  "Don't say `sanctify me!'"
        
             But I cried out, "Oh, God! Oh, God--sanctify me!"
        
             When  I  cried out for God to sanctify me, the  Holy  Spirit 
        operated  in  my heart.  I knelt at the altar  and  continued  to 
        pray, but the work had already begun.  My sanctification  started 
        not at the altar, but in the aisle as I went forward for  prayer.  
        I  was so certain that I didn't believe in  sanctification  after 
        conversion, but I knew it began right then in my heart by  faith.  
        I know that I am spiritually bankrupt and have so little of God's 
        love,  but  He started a work in my heart  that  September  night 
        which  has  never stopped.  It has continued on and  on,  by  His 
        Spirit.
        
             Before  this work of God in my heart, I would get  angry.  I 
        would  become hostile.  I was a fast mover and my wife was  slow.  
        I would say, "Hurry up, Honey, let's get started; we are going to 
        be  late!"   The more I talked the more  frustrated  she  became.  
        After  I was sanctified, I could help her instead of  making  her 
        feel  badly.   I  found  I could  help  bathe  the  children.   I 
        discovered that the Lord was making me longsuffering and granting 
        me  patience.  He began to take out of me the harshness that  was 
        under  the surface of my personality.  He began to eradicate  the 
        anger.   He started slaying those things out of me which  grieved 
        Him,
        
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        and still continues to refine the inward man.  Praise the Lord.
        
             Now  when  you are saved, you are saved from  the  sins  you 
        committed  since you reached the age of accountability, when  you 
        first  knew right from wrong.  When you are sanctified,  you  are 
        cleansed  from  the  Sin  Principle with  which  you  were  born, 
        something you have inherited by nature of the flesh.  The work of 
        the  Holy Spirit is to come into your life, cleanse out all  this 
        uncleanness  by slaying you, and then to fill you as much  as  He 
        can as quickly as He can with the fullness of His Spirit.
        
             This  doctrine  has divided many churches, and we  must  not 
        dwell  on definitions, theological discussions, or anything  that 
        would divide us.  The Holy Spirit works with every man and  woman 
        a  little  differently.  Don't try to obtain an  experience  like 
        someone else or follow another person's pattern.  Only seek Jesus 
        and His love.  Set your heart and mind like a flint on Jesus, and 
        resist  all  confusion, frustration, or upheaval, permitting  the 
        Holy Spirit to lead you.
        
             God wants the whole church to be sanctified, to be set apart 
        for Him; and we must persevere all the while to maintain it.   It 
        has  been  my observation over the years that a  good  number  of 
        people  who  think  they have persevered to  be  sanctified  have 
        really  only  been soundly converted.  I think many  persons have 
        never actually gotten through to true holiness of heart.  We stop 
        short  of  it and are in a form.  We are more conformed  to  this 
        world  than we are surrendered to God.  If God could find  a  few 
        who were all for Him--oh, what He couldn't do for Jesus' glory.
        
             Now,  beloved, I preached a good while before I  knew  this, 
        and  I  am  still  learning.   Many  suppose  that  they  can  be 
        sanctified  when  they  are  living  rather  casual,  wishy-washy 
        spiritual  lives.  But the candidate for  sanctification  is  the 
        person  who  is  seeking  ' first  the  Kingdom  of  God,' 
        who has the love and joy of Jesus in his heart, and is striving
        with all his might to obey God.
        
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             For many years my burden has been that God wants the  entire 
        church  body--all  of us, every part--to  be  sanctified.   Jesus 
        said, "Sanctify them through thy truth; thy word is truth and
        for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also might be sanctified,
        through the truth that they all might be one; as thou, Father, art
        in Me, and I in thee, that they also might be one in us: that the
        world may believe that thou has sent me."
        
             Twenty  years  ago  that  struck  me  so  deeply: "...that
        the world may believe that thou has sent me." The world will never
        truly know that Jesus, the Son of God, is a real Person, the only
        Saviour, until the entire church is sanctified.  I am more and more
        convinced that every man, woman, boy and girl needs to be sanctified.
        If we don't persevere to it, we are going to come short of  God's 
        will,  and untold millions of souls could be lost in  an  endless 
        eternity.
        
             Many  who  do  not yet know Jesus  could  possibly  be  lost 
        because we in the church did not press on in the Kingdom to heart 
        cleansing,  to  the  oneness for which Jesus  prayed  nearly  two 
        thousand  years  ago.   And because we failed to  arrive  in  the 
        Kingdom  where we were needed, the power of God was not  able  to 
        flow  through the Body and draw sinners to Jesus.  The  power 
        of  God  is  able  to  work through  any  Body  of  believers  in 
        proportion  to  their  whole-hearted  obedience,  their  complete 
        surrender, and their entire sanctification.
        
             When  a  person  is sanctified by the  Holy  Spirit,  he  is 
        wonderful to get along with.  He is kind, gentle,  longsuffering, 
        and,  by God's grace, does not find fault.  He is  a  peacemaker, 
        helping,  lifting, and encouraging everyone.  He is full  of  joy 
        that is actually "unspeakable and full of glory."
        
             Of  course,  sanctification is merely the beginning  of  the 
        walk  with  God.   One can't sit down and think it  is  going  to 
        automatically  last forever.  Years ago people had the idea  that 
        all  they had to do was go forward once to be  sanctified.   They 
        would  fold their hands and rest on that experience.  But we  are 
        only in the beginning.  Now we start the daily
        
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        life  of  dying  out to Self--that inner slaying which  only  the 
        Holy Spirit can bring about.  It is a waiting on God, looking  to 
        Him  daily  for  our  life and strength.   It  is  pressing  into 
        continuous self-denial to take up the cross and follow Jesus.
        
             When  we  are sanctified, it shows all over.   We  become  a 
        light  wherever we are.  We no longer complain about the  church, 
        murmur  over activities, or find fault with individuals.  We  are 
        filled  with  praise  and  thanksgiving.   When  the  pastor   is 
        preaching, we are there praying for him, crying out to Jesus  for 
        help, and laboring together with him.  We won't be sitting on the 
        back pew with a glum, disinterested face.
        
             Once  God  begins the work of sanctification within  us,  we 
        want  nothing  more than to hear the Word which will  expose  the 
        yet-darkened  rooms  of our heart to the glorious  light  of  the 
        Gospel.   We will delight in hearing the Word preached under  the 
        anointing more than we want to attend football games,  basketball 
        games, or carnivals.
        
             Once  we really start seeking heart purity and  holiness  of 
        heart,  we  will start making things right with our  fellow  man.  
        Pencils  that we've "borrowed" from the office will be  replaced.  
        Tools  that  we  have taken from the shop will  be  returned  and 
        apologies  made.   Old unpaid bills will be made  right.   Unkind 
        remarks and criticisms about the pastor, our neighbor, relatives, 
        boss, or employees will grieve us deeply, and we will need to ask 
        forgiveness.  Many little things will need to be put in order.
        
             One  day  when in the seventh grade, I met  my  high  school 
        coach in the hall.  The boys had tried him severely that day  and 
        when  I asked him when we were going to have gym, he  turned  and 
        kicked  me in the side.  Though he didn't kick me hard enough  to 
        hurt me, I rather resented it.
        
             There  came  a  time when I had to  be  cleansed  from  that 
        resentment  in my heart and ask his forgiveness.  I told him,  "I 
        am sorry.  I am ashamed that I allowed any little thought to come 
        between us like that."  But when Satan put this resentment in  my 
        mind, I entertained it long enough for it to
        
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        fall  into  my heart and lodge there.  I had to ask the  Lord  to 
        slay that out of me and make it right.
        
             If we are going to seek perfection of heart, we are going to 
        be  making  restitutions.  We cannot detour making  things  right 
        with  our  fellow man.  Christ really wants purity  of  heart,  a 
        holiness  of  the interior life, in His Church.  He says  in  His 
        Word:  "Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without 
        which no man shall see the Lord." We are to seek to be a pure
        people.  We are to persevere to perfection.
        
             "Now  Brother  Helm," I can hear someone say.   "Surely  you 
        know that one cannot be perfect in this life, and there is no use  
        trying."
        
             I  want  to tell you, if engineers and  machinists  had  not 
        tried  to make those cylinders in my car perfect, I would  be  in 
        trouble.   If the interior of my automobile engine is not  tooled 
        properly, if the valves aren't seated just as they should be,  it 
        will lose compression and run short of power, and the engine  may 
        even  be  damaged.   Likewise,  the person  who  is  bogged  down 
        spiritually and who is not climbing well has something wrong with 
        the  workings of his soul.  Either the heart is not seated  quite 
        properly  in  love,  or the soul is not quite in  line  with  the 
        perfect will of God. 
        
             Most people do not want to hear about Christian  perfection.  
        The  carnal mind resents and resists any mention of heart  purity 
        or  of  absolute surrender.  But the apostle Paul held  it  high.  
        John  Wesley  taught it.  Charles G. Finney,  D.S.  Warner,  E.E. 
        Byrum,  A.  B.  Simpson,  Bud Robinson,  and  many  other  humble 
        servants  of  God preached it and sought to live it.  I  need  to 
        seek  a  heart of purity and determine at the very center  of  my 
        heart to be perfect in Christ.  If such a devout determination is 
        not there, God is disappointed with me.  I have been born in  sin 
        and am chief of sinners, yet Jesus died to save me not only  "out 
        of" my sins, but "from" all Sin. It is His desire to get
        me completely out of the sin business.  He suffered on the cross
        that I could be sanctified, cleansed, and made partaker in His
        divine nature.
        
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             Jesus  Himself  encouraged us: "Be ye therefore perfect 
         even as your Father which is in  heaven is  perfect." Many
        individuals are striving to attain perfection in worldly things. 
        Every athlete, for example, is striving for perfection.  Wouldn't
        it be wonderful if Christian people exerted every effort to be 
        perfectin heart as these athletes daily run several miles to 
        improve their skills and their capacity? The athlete is pleased
        at the fatigue his exercise produces.  It gives him satisfaction.
        When it comes to striving for the perfection of the soul, however,
        the carnal mind will contend, "That is foolish. Don't do it.  Let
        us alone. Don't try to tell us that we are supposed to be perfect."
        
             But we are to strive for perfection.  God is pleased when we 
        endeavor  to go on to perfection.  He is deeply grieved  when  we 
        settle  for  less than His best.  Perfection is  only  known  and 
        arrived  at  through  the grace of God;  through  the  Spirit  of 
        Christ;  by self-denial, under the cross, dying daily, as we  are 
        yielded and rejoicing.
        
             I  am convinced that there are very, very few persons  truly 
        sanctified.   Some have started, but few have continued to  press 
        in  obedience and persevere in self-denial until God could  truly 
        cleanse  their  hearts and come into their lives  with  His  Holy 
        Spirit.  It cannot take  place without a crucifixion.  
        It is an inner dying out to the ways of the flesh, so Christ can
        really live in us.
        
             John  T.  Hatfield, that marvelous man of God,  had  such  a 
        nature before he was sanctified that once, when his wife was  not 
        punctual  as he was ready to go to church, he took the horse  and 
        buggy  on and let her walk.  She was a precious saint  and  never 
        said a word.  She walked to church, presently making her way into 
        the  service  and sitting beside him with a sweet  smile  on  her 
        face.  "She was as calm as a May morning and as patient as a  jug 
        of  molasses  under  a kitchen table,"   John  mentioned  in  his 
        autobiography.*
        
        
        *Thirty-Three  Years  a Live Wire, John T.  Hatfield,  Revivalist 
        Press, Cincinnati, Ohio.
        
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             John  had  been saved eight years before he first  heard  of 
        inward  holiness  of  heart.  But once his  pastor  obtained  the 
        blessing  during  a  holiness camp meeting  and  began  to  teach 
        sanctification,  John, T. was convicted for it.   He  prayed  and 
        cried  out  for  this experience so fervently that  he  was  soon 
        blessed mightily and thought he had been sanctified.
        
             One  evening  he  and his wife began the task  of  moving  a 
        setting  hen to a more desirable place.  After  transferring  the 
        eggs,  John, T. gently put the hen back on the nest.  Instead  of 
        settling down quietly, the hen stood back up.  John T. placed her 
        back on the nest.  Again the hen came right back up.  Every  time 
        she  jumped  up, he set her back down, each time  a  little  more 
        forcibly.  "Sit down on those eggs now!" he commanded.
        
             Since she couldn't understand that kind of language, back up 
        she  came.  He didn't know how to talk hen-talk and he  tried  to 
        convince her to set on those eggs in his own way.  By the time he 
        was  through,  several eggs were broken, the hen had lost  a  few 
        feathers,  and John had found out that he wasn't sanctified.   He 
        had only been blessed.
        
             On  another occasion he thought he would wean the  new  calf 
        from  its  mother  to a bucket.  It had nursed  long  enough,  he 
        decided.  Placing some milk in a bucket, he very gently tried  to 
        coax the calf to sample it.  Each time he got near the calf  with 
        the  bucket, however, the little animal would stick its  nose  in 
        the  air.  Sometimes a calf will drink the milk right  away,  but 
        often  it takes awhile.  "Here," he said, "put your  head  down."  
        Of course, the calf couldn't understand what John was telling him 
        and every time its head would rear up.
        
             After  much effort, John got the calf's nose down  into  the 
        milk.   At this, it became wild with fright, prancing around  and 
        standing on its hind legs.  Mrs. Hatfield had been trying to hold 
        the  bucket  for her husband.  Soon John was telling her  how  to 
        hold the container, and in a very loud voice.
        
             His store of patience exhausted, John leaped on top of
        
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        that  little  calf, grabbed it by both its ears, and  shoved  its 
        head  down into the milk up to its eyes.  The calf gave  one  big 
        heave,  sending  John T., his wife, and the milk sailing.   If  I 
        recall  correctly, he confessed to such anger that he kicked  the 
        calf  out of the stall and threatened to kill it.  He, like  many 
        of us before God cleanses us, had a powerful temper.  Once  again 
        he realized that he wasn't sanctified.  He really thought he  had 
        obtained it, but he hadn't.  He had only prayed until he had been 
        blessed.
        
             However, there was a memorable night when John was asked  by 
        his  pastor to pray for the seekers who were at the  altar.   God 
        had  blessed his soul wonderfully that night, but as the  service 
        continued he felt the need for a clean heart more than ever.   He 
        had never longed to be delivered of his evil temper more than  at 
        that moment.
        
             He  began to pray for the weeping seekers at the altar,  but 
        before long was praying for himself.  For six months he had  been 
        seeking  the work of entire sanctification in his heart.  He  had 
        prayed  through blessing after blessing, but still the "old  man" 
        held  control of his life.  On this night the Holy Spirit  helped 
        him to see that he had been praying himself up to the  blessings, 
        but he had not actually exercised his faith to take hold of God's 
        promise.  He reached the point where he said in his heart, "Lord, 
        I  do believe!"  and instantly the fire fell.  He knew  the  work 
        was  done!  God had sanctified John T. Hatfield.  (And as I  tell 
        you this, the power of God is flowing through my body  witnessing 
        to the fact that he was truly sanctified.)
        
             The morning after this blessed experience he was out milking 
        his cow, an animal which had given him considerable trouble.  She 
        often waited until the bucket was nearly full, then she would let 
        go  with a powerful kick that sent the milk flying.  In  previous 
        days John had kicked her, cuffed her, and called her all kinds of 
        names.
        
             This  morning he was so lost in the joy of Jesus within  his 
        heart that he hardly noticed the cow.  But just as he had
        
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        finished and started to stand up with a full bucket of warm milk, 
        the  cow gave a sudden kick which sent milk flying.   That  warm, 
        sticky  liquid  splashed  all  over John's head,  his  face,  his 
        clothing, and trickled down his neck.  
             
             Instead of cuffing and cursing her as he had in days before, 
        John  calmly stepped to the front of the stall, put his  hand  on 
        the  cow's back, and gently confessed that he had been the  cause 
        of  her  kicking.  "You're a good old cow,"  he told  that  lowly 
        farm animal, "and I love you.  My kicking days are over.  If  you 
        want to kick, you go right ahead.  But I want you to know that  I 
        am sanctified--the kick is out of me."
        
             The story tells that John's wife saw him coming up the  path 
        that  morning  from the barn, milk dripping from his  hands,  his 
        face,  his  clothing, and a smile all across his face!   She  was 
        satisfied at last that he had struck the Rock.  The "old man" had 
        been slain.  John had been sanctified at last!
        
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